PEACE AT her sparkle-chrome kitchen table. The lacquered surface covered with beading trays, cigar boxes of beads, stacked papers. Snow and Josette carefully slipped very old letters into page protectors. Most of the paper that Wolfred Roberts had written on through the 1860s, then 1870s, was still thick and supple. Some was more brittle, lined, torn from ledgers.That old-time paper was made so well, said Mrs. Peace. Stuff nowadays crumbles in a few years.It’s the acid, said Snow. There’s acid in most paper now.Wolfred Roberts had written fair copies of the letters he had sent in order to recover his stolen wife, fiercely building an archive in his quest. The dates were on the letters, and there was a record of the dates they were mailed, and dates upon which he received replies, if there were replies.The original backup plan, said Josette.He used his training as a fur trade clerk, said Mrs. Peace. Keeping track of every transaction. My aunt told me that he kept these letters in a metal box, locked.
